


Day 5: Megatron

by GemmaRose



Series: Lost Light Fest 2018 [5]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Functionist Universe (Transformers), M/M, Major Character Injury, Medical Procedures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 16:43:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16201553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GemmaRose/pseuds/GemmaRose
Summary: Megatron is having A Day. The last thing he needs is a lecture from Anode while he's just trying to get his damn chest patched up.





	Day 5: Megatron

“Enforcers!” an unfamiliar voice shouted, and a nano-klik later the door high above them slammed open.

“Nine-of-Twelve, Megatron, this way!” another unfamiliar mech shouted as the gathering erupted into chaos, and Megatron shouldered his way through the crowd after a mech he thought he recognised as one of the locals who’d greeted them when they arrived. Behind him he could hear blaster fire and screams, bellowed orders for the mechs to get on their knees and come quietly.

“You there, halt!” an enforcer shouted from behind them, and Megatron was glad for a nano-klik that he was bringing up the rear. Nine-of-Twelve and the mech leading them would be hidden from the enforcer’s camera’d optics. “Halt or be-” the mech cut off with a shout, and Megatron chanced a look over his shoulder to see the enforcer hopping on one pede, energon flowing freely from between the fingers clutched around his other ankle.

“You should be safe through here.” the local mech said, keying in the code to open a door. “Hurry, before they send another after us.”

“Thank you.” Nine-of-Twelve said earnestly, clasping the mech’s hands in his own. “Your bravery will be remembered.”

The mech smiled, tight and fearful, and Megatron clenched his jaw as he followed Nine-of-Twelve out through the bolt hole. This was the only part of his vow he regretted, having to run when enforcers found out about an AVL meeting instead of standing and defending the mechs he’d just spent half a cycle talking to. But looking at where violence had gotten him the first time... better to run than to risk that happening again.

“Orion, the meeting was compromised. We need extraction.” he said into his comm, ducking under a thick beam wedged between the walls that stretched up over them as an improvised support.

“En route.” Orion’s voice came back through the tinny little speaker. “Where are you?”

“West of the meeting place, heading south.”

“I can intercept you at the overpass.”

“See you there.” he turned off the communicator and tucked it back in his subspace. “The overpass.” he told Nine-of-Twelve, who nodded and picked up the pace. He could hear sirens closing in around them, and if they were cut off then things were going to get much more complicated. They moved as silently as they could at speed, and the bridge was in sight when Nine-of-Twelve next spoke.

“Watch out!” the ex-councilmech dove forwards, and out of the corner of his optic Megatron saw the glow of a charged plasma cannon. He threw himself backwards, but it still seared across his chestplate, taking off a good chunk of the raised center.

He hissed in pain, but charged forwards anyway as he got a location ping on his internal comms. “Now!” he snapped at Nine-of-Twelve as he reached the bridge, optics locking on a familiar convoy barelling down the lane nearest them. His plating gave an unholy screech as he vaulted the railing, metal shearing apart as he twisted to land on his back atop Orion’s open trailer full of scrap. It was far from comfortable, or dignified for either of them, but as the flashing lights of the enforcers faded behind them he didn’t care that horribly much.

It wasn’t more than a few kliks later that Orion came to a stop, and Megatron got to his feet with a groan. Nine-of-Twelve extracted himself from the scrap in the trailer, and Orion disengaged from it before transforming. “Are you alright?” he asked, looking between them.

“I’ve functioned through worse.” he grumbled, pressing a hand over the hole in his chest plating. Only very, _very_ rarely had he been injured badly enough to expose his spark chamber, and to have it happen again in an ambush made what little pride he still had sting.

“I don’t doubt it.” Orion chuckled, optics brightening slightly as he smiled behind his facemask. “But still, best we get you back to Anode as soon as possible.”

“Agreed.” he nodded, and looked to Nine-of-Twelve. As a security measure, having only one of them know where the AVL was moving to next was a solid strategy. In practice, though, it was more than a little inconvenient. The ex-councilmech looked around, likely checking their current location against his internal maps, then turned on his heel and started off down the nearest tunnel.

“This way.” he said, gesturing for them to follow. Megatron rolled his optics, but when Orion gestured for him to go first he let the convoy take the rear. They moved slower now than they had aboveground, Nine-of-Twelve leading them quietly through disused maintenance tunnels. His own internal maps were nowhere near as detailed as Nine-of-Twelve’s, but Megatron was sure they were well outside the city when they stopped in a large cistern.

“How long will we be waiting here?” Orion asked, and Nine-of-Twelve’s helm cocked slightly to the side as he checked his chronometer.

“Five kliks, approximately.”

“Wonderful.” Megatron drawled, looking down at the ankle-deep oil. It was seeping into his seams already, and he was very much _not_ looking forward to scrubbing it out later. Of course, he could always just let it wash out over time, but even just thinking about it he remembered the scandalised look Rodimus got when he found out how little effort Megatron put into his appearance. He’d probably make the same face now if he knew what Megatron was considering, and just the memory of his not-quite-conjunx’s disdain was enough to make him reconsider the amount of effort he should put into his cleaning later.

It was probably a little pathetic, that the memory of a mech who abandoned him less than a deca-cycle after their spark-merge still held such power over him, but as long as nobody else knew about it there was no reason for him to be ashamed.The wait passed in silence, mercifully quick for all that it felt like a small eternity, and when the top of the cistern opened up he didn’t hesitate to follow Nine-of-Twelve up the ladder that dropped down for them. They were, in fact, outside the city limits, but not by much. The mech who’d dropped the ladder for them, a new recruit he’d not had the chance to get to know yet, winced and ex-vented with a pained hiss at the sight of his mangled chestplate.

“Should get that looked at.” he said, inclining his helm towards the injury as Orion pulled himself up onto the ground.

“Really?” he said drily. “The thought hadn’t crossed my mind.”

Nine-of-Twelve sighed heavily, and Orion rolled his optics as he moved to help close up the cistern again. “Go. Anode will be furious if you wait around for us.”

“She’ll be furious regardless.” Megatron grimaced, but followed as Nine-of-Twelve led him away from the city. The little aeroplane medic was a force to be reckoned with, and while she lacked Ratchet’s age and size she easily made up for it with a voice like frozen oil and an uncanny optic for where exactly to strike for maximum pain with minimal damage. With resources as difficult to come by as they currently were, she’d be downright furious that he went and got nearly a third of his breastplate shot off.

\---

As he’d expected, Anode was... less than pleased about the condition he returned in. Orion and the new recruit had caught up shortly before they reached the hideout of the deca-cycle, and Orion insisted on walking him right to the makeshift medbay, as if he was an unruly newbuild who’d try to weld his own patch on instead of risking the medic’s wrath. Anode’s anger hadn’t lasted long though, and once she shooed Orion off she directed Megatron to lay down on the low berth and went to fetch her tools.

“Alright, lemme see the damage.” she demanded, and he reluctantly lowered his arm. The green light of his spark shone through the sliver sliced out of his casing he’d had excised to forge his first deceptibrand, and Anode’s optic ridges drew together as the strip of light played over her lower face. “Well, good news, your self repair’s already taken care of the damaged energon lines well enough. The remaining damage is cosmetic, nothing structural.”

“And what other news is there?” he frowned. A medic using that tone very rarely boded well for the patient.

“I need you to open your spark chamber.”

His optics widened and he reflexively pressed a hand to his chest, covering his currently-exposed spark as best he could. “Why?”

“Just do it.” Anode glared. He met her gaze, but after a klik of silence sighed and lowered his hand, sending the command for his chest plating to part and spark casing to open p. Anode leaned over him further, bracing one hand on his arm as she examined his spark critically. Looking for what, he didn’t know, but spark related problems were bad news. “Well, can’t say I’ve seen that in person before.” she remarked as she straightened up, giving his arm a pat.

“Seen what before?” he asked, closing his spark chamber and sitting up gingerly.

“You’re sparked.”

“I’m what?” he frowned.

“Sparked. With spark. Carrying.” Anode rattled off, and after a few nano-kliks of being on the receiving end of his blank stare she sighed. “You don’t know what that is, do you?”

He shook his helm.

“Well, practically, it means you can’t spark merge safely until the newspark’s been absorbed back into yours.” she moved off towards a rack of flat metal sheets.

“What in the pit is a newspark?” Megatron asked, pressing a hand over his spark chamber again. Anode let out a heavy sigh.

“When two mechs or femmes love each other very much, sometimes they sparkbond.” she said, adopting something of a patronising tone. “If they share a mutual overload while merged, the surge can take the excess energy of the two excited sparks and fuse it into a third spark signature. A newspark.”

A third spark signature. Megatron looked down at his chest, tilting his hand slightly so he could see the band of light running along the length of his palm. Now that he was looking, he could see it fluctuating slightly, one part pulsing more blue with every spin of his spark. “I was unaware such a thing could happen.” he said, his voice coming out soft.

“Eh, don’t beat yourself up about it.” Anode said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Most mechs don’t, ‘less they’re medics. There’s only something like a seventy percent chance of it happening on any given sparkmerge meeting the requirements, and if a sparked mech merges again the newspark dissipates. I’ve heard it’s not quite comfortable, once it’s past a deca-cycle or two, but those things are fragile.”

The sound of cutting metal filled his audials, and Megatron slowly laid back down on the medi-berth. He couldn’t tear his optics from the soft pulse of blue in the light of his spark, the result of his only merge in the last few million meta-cycles. “What would it take, to make this newspark a proper cybertronian?” he asked when Anode finished cutting the metal for his temporary patch and hauled it over.

“Time, a viable photonic crystal, and an appropriate amount of sentio metallico.” she rattled off easily as she rested the patch against the edge of the berth and pulled out a handheld cutter. “And those last two are damn impossible to find. ’S why it’s not common knowledge, really.”

“And time?” Megatron prompted, watching the medic’s face as she trimmed away jagged upturned edges of his armour.

“Even if by some miracle we did have a crystal onhand, the newspark’s not yet strong enough to survive without yours for support.”

“Ah.” he nodded his understanding, and let his gaze return to the ceiling as Anode swapped her cutter for a welding torch, returning his hand to his side so she could situate the patch over his missing plating. “And, if I should acquire a viable crystal and sentio metalico, I assume there is a window of time in which the newspark will be forgeable?”

Anode lifted the welder from his chest, and though he felt her optics on him he didn’t meet them. “Yes.” she said after a moment of silence. “But unless you have an undamaged photonic crystal and its sentio in your subspace, that doesn’t matter.”

“Of course.” he agreed, keeping his optics on the ceiling. He’d just have to keep his optics open while they were travelling. Maybe, just maybe, he’d get lucky and be able to give Rodimus’s newspark a chance at an actual life.


End file.
